Never-before-seen footage of John Lennon and Yoko Ono Lennon, filmed in July 1968 at John’s first major art show You Are Here (To Yoko From John Lennon, With Love) at London’s Robert Fraser Gallery, has been paired together with the brand new Ultimate Mix of “You Are Here,” from his 1973 album Mind Games, for a new video.
Directed by John Lennon and filmed by William Wareing and Dick Lorriemore, the restored video from the Lenono Film Archives captures a 27-year-old John on June 30, 1968, as he, Robert Fraser and their team make last minute preparations for the art show, culminating with the festive opening the following day, July 1. At the time, John would have been in the midst of writing and recording The Beatles’ eponymous album, more popularly known as The White Album, which released just a few months later in November 1968.
“It consisted of a bare gallery and a big white canvas that was round and it just had my writing on it: ‘you are here’ and I dedicated it to Yoko,” said John of the “You Are Here” exhibition which also contained an assortment of charity collection boxes. “I wrote to a lot of charities telling them about the exhibition,” he said at the time. “I had a lot of nice letters and a lot of charity boxes back. There are no hidden secrets. My art is in fact displaying these boxes for charity.”
The film crew, which was set up behind a dark window in the style of the hidden camera “Candid Camera” TV show, filmed people’s honest and at times humorous reactions as they walked through the gallery and encountered the various donation boxes which led up to the huge circular canvas with John’s handwritten message: “you are here.” Next to the minimalist artwork was a hat to put money in for “the artist” and a large jar filled with small white badges so attendees could take the poignant proclamation with them.
The video “You Are Here” shows John and Yoko, dressed in white to match the art exhibit, and a fashionable crowd of hundreds, which included various guests, reporters and such Beatles and Apple Corps associates as Derek Taylor, Jill Johnston, Kevin Harrington, Neil Aspinall, Richard DiLello, gallery owner Robert Fraser, artist Richard Hamilton (who designed The Beatles’ White Album cover and inserts), and actor Victor Spinetti, as they release 365 helium-filled balloons into the London sky. Attached to each balloon was a printed card with the words “you are here” on one side and a message to write John Lennon via the gallery if they found a balloon on the other. John then sent back a signed letter with one of the badges.
“'You Are Here' - that's more than just a joke, I suppose,” said John about the mindfulness mantra. “People read it and suddenly realise it's true. 'Yes, I'm here,' they think. 'So are these other people. We're all here together.' And that's where the vibrations start being exchanged. Good and bad ones according to who is sending out and how they feel. A lot of people went to India to find out they were here. Like [Timothy] Leary's friend Richard Alpert [Ram Dass] went to India and saw all the gurus, chasing all over the place, and all the gurus said to him was, 'Remember, be here now'. That's all them gurus will ever tell you. Remember this moment now.”
“You Are Here,” is a tranquil, poetic song with heartfelt lyrics about their love: “From Liverpool to Tokyo… what a way to go.” Newly mixed from the original tapes by producer Sean Ono Lennon with triple Grammy Award-winning producer/engineer Paul Hicks and engineering by Sam Gannon, the winsome track sounds better than ever as the instrumentation, previously buried in a muddy and thin treble-heavy mix, has been made more prominent, allowing the playing of John Lennon (vocal, acoustic guitar, various percussion) and his sensational band of David Spinozza (electric guitar), Gordon Edwards (bass), Jim Keltner (drums), Ken Ascher (piano, organs), “Sneaky” Pete Kleinlow (pedal steel guitar) and background vocals by Something Different (Angel Coakley, Christine Wiltshire, Jocelyn Brown, Kathy Mull).
Watch the video Here
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